My Top 1000 Songs #978: To Claudia On Thursday

[I've been writing up my Top 1000 songs on a daily basis--you can see them all in descending order by hitting the All My Favorite Songs tag.]

We were just chatting about Sagittarius, the mildly-psychedelic sunshine pop collaboration between producer/songwriter Gary Usher and singer Curt Boettcher... so let's close out the Boettcher loop with his other great project, The Millennium. Their lone proper album, 1968's Begin (though some other work has also crept out over the years) was a delightful milestone in the genre, sweet and earnest and endlessly pretty, better suited for after than during the acid trip. It opens with a terrific harpsichord-ish instrumental prelude--called "Prelude," in case it wasn't clear--before segueing into "To Claudia On Thursday," which adeptly walks the line between twee sunshine and just-barely-druggy pop-psych. I can't think of anything that sounds quite like it, too uncool for rock yet pushing boundaries in its own way, comfortably trippy yet full of heartfelt hope.

Cover version from Denny Doherty (The Mamas & The Papas):

Live cover version from The Flat Five:

Disco(!) version from mid-70s Canadian act C.B. Victoria: